I’m a big sports fan, and baseball is my number one. The Phillies are just… they’re just wonderful and Cole Hamels is one of the leaders of our team. Last night during a game in Washington Cole Hamels hit the Washington Nationals’ newcomer, Bryce Harper, with a pitch that sent Harper to first. Big deal, happens all the time. In fact, just a few innings later the Nationals’ pitcher Ryan Zimmerman somehow made the same little flub and hit Hamels while he was at bat. The odds!

Today Cole Hamels came out admitting that he intentionally hit Bryce Harper during the pitch, saying “That’s just — you know what, it’s something that I grew up watching, that’s what happened, so I’m just trying to continue the old baseball — I think some people kind of get away from it. I remember when I was a rookie the strike zone was really, really small and you didn’t say anything just because that’s the way baseball is. Sometimes the league is protecting certain players and making it not that old-school, prestigious way of baseball.”

Did Hamels need to open his mouth and admit what he did? No, not really and I don’t really see why he did. But I don’t respect him any less, because he was just stating the obvious. Stating what everyone that watches baseball knows, that pitchers hit players on purpose. It’s a part of the game that I originally hated, but have now accepted. Every player expects it, every pitcher knows they have to do it. It’s a part of the game, as much as stealing bases and using a glove is. And Hamels didn’t aim for a knee cap, or elbow, or wrist, or somewhere that could end this kid’s career. He hit him in the butt. So maybe baby Bryce will have a bruise on his tushy for a few days, but besides that everyone survives another game (except Jayson Werth, but that’s another story entirely) .

After Cole Hamels came out saying what he did, the Nationals General Manager Mike Rizzo decided he needed to open his pie hole (the Nationals entire league is always flapping their gums about something) and call Hamels a string of weak insults, like “fake tough” for hitting a young player and saying it was a “It was a gutless chicken [bleep] [bleeping] act.”

Mike Rizzo is an idiot. Oh yeah, Cole Hamels is “fake tough” for intentionally hitting a player and then admitting it. Because Zimmerman didn’t intentionally hit Hamels later on and then say nothing. That seems more “fake tough” to me. And every single pitcher in the MLB doesn’t do the exact same thing. Cole Hamels just has the guts to come out and admit it while Zimmerman sits behind his GM sucking his thumb as he rants like an idiot. Chase Utley used to be the most hit player in the league and you don’t see any Phillie fans (or general managers for that matter) whining about it.

The fact is that intentional hits are a part of baseball. Hamels is a seasoned player who understands that. And just because a player is young doesn’t save him from the consequences of being a professional baseball player. It’s kind of pathetic that people are crowding around this player and sheltering him just because he’s young. If you can’t handle playing with the big boys then go back to t-ball. (sidenote: I dislike Bryce Harper, mainly because he feels the need to COVER HIS FACE in eye black. Stupid kid.)

First of all, Rizzo, and every Nationals fan out there don’t kid yourself: there is no Phillies/Nationals rivalry. The Phillies own Washington D.C., it’s obvious every time they roll in with full force for every series. The only reason Philadelphia comes into Washington D.C. during the series in the first place is because tickets are easier to get than in Philly, its relatively close, and it’s a fun weekend trip. Not because anyone in Philadelphia feels any sort of threat, rivalry, or fear over the Nationals, a team with the same logo as Walgreens. Yet they still insist on constantly pushing this “rivalry” like something between the two teams exist. The Nationals are annoying. They’re like the kid in high school that chases you around at the end of the year relentlessly trying to get you to sign their yearbook. Just quit already.

The Nationals are a bunch of whiners trying to start a rivalry with a team that easily surpasses their talent and history by leaps and bounds. They need to stop wasting their time, grabbing the Phillies sloppy seconds, and learn a little bit more about baseball before they open their mouths, because now Rizzo just sounds flat-out stupid.